PHILIP KOESTER
I try and fill the sail up with a lot of wind and pump as much as possible in the bottom turn so I can get speed and reach the top of the wave again. I have been training a lot at home in light winds. I have a 105 litre board so that helped in Tenerife. The biggest sail I used was a 5.7m but most of the time I was on a 5.3m. Nothing really felt like it worked for me when it was very light. When the conditions were much better it was no problem, but we had a few heats in very marginal conditions. In the heat against Brawzinho the wind just stopped. I tried to stay high on the wave but actually you had to drop low to get the right speed to make it up again. It was very tricky sailing. You are actually surfing the wave more than windsurfing. Then I bring in new tricks like the reverse rather than wave riding.
I was on a production twin fin. I just took bigger fins, 17.5 cm, normally I use 16 cm. That seemed to work ok. If they keep on running in very marginal conditions though I will have to find a bigger board that planes really fast. My boards still work, but I do not know where the competition wind limit is anymore!
“ Pump as much as possible in the bottom turn.”